What Good PMs Don't Do
Let's do what's necessary, not what's easy
I’ve been a misfit for most of my career.
When I started my journey as a software developer, I wanted to create valuable solutions. The only thing I didn’t want was to create something nobody used. So I asked many questions to the point I got a nickname, Mr. Why. Somebody once told me: “It’s your job to code, not to question the requirements.” I hated that answer.
Later in life, I got the chance to become a product manager. My initial objective was to provide software developers with the why behind the what and to come up with the how together. Yet, my quest for answers wasn’t easy. I tried to keep the team focused and kept saying no to distractions to the point I got a new nickname, Business Blocker.
Guess what happened when I grew into head of product? Another nickname, Product Firewall. Every time, I did my best to ensure product teams had clear goals to pursue instead of prescriptive roadmaps. Not an easy task.
By most standards, I’m a terrible Product Manager. Yet, it’s hard to be a good PM when most companies expect you to be bad.
Let me share five things good PMs don’t do, though companies want them to do so.
Side note: If you want to learn in-depth what product management looks like in reality and how to do what’s necessary to thrive. Check out my book :)
1. Output Roadmaps
Companies long for predictability. Business people will love you if you give them precise output roadmaps. Yet, that will trap teams into feature factory modes.
Let me be blunt: the more precise your roadmap is, the bigger the lie you have.
Creating digital products is complex. You will be surprised because you don’t know what you don’t know.
What do good PMs do if everyone longs for predictability and they refuse to do it? Fair question. Here’s what they do:
Agree on what you aim to achieve
Commit to desired results
Make incremental bets to progress
Decide based on evidence
Cut the losers, double down on the winners
Principle: Make incremental bets instead of upfront investments.
2. Long-term Planning
Depending on your scenario, you will have high expectations of what your product will cover for the next two to three years. Let’s start with the truth: You don’t know. Unless you have a project in front of you, it’s impossible to know what your product covers.
Creating a product means continuous inspection and adaptation. Most things don’t resist contact with reality.
Here’s why good PMs don’t do long-term planning
Planning is guessing
The more you plan, the more you’re guessing
Extensive plans make teams blind to reality
So, what do good PMs do instead?
Let’s start with the following: The B2C scenario won’t pressure you that much to provide such long forecasts, so it’s easier. Good PMs point directions where they aim to explore, which relates to product strategy:
Current year: Growth. Expand to different locations.
Upcoming year: Customer Lifetime Value. Increase our product offering to raise customer value and upsell.
Is these ultra-simplistic? Probably, but enough to know what you don’t do now and focus on exploring. Yet, that won’t cut for B2B companies. The scenario is more complex. Customers want more clarity on what you will cover, and here lies a giant trap. Name what you deliver, and you will end up creating features instead of driving outcomes. How do good PMs solve that?
Define what you aim to enable. For example, in a complex B2B product, you can name the area you want to cover in your product instead of features.
Clarity on who you serve. Who’s your target audience? Reflect on company size, location, and situation. You can define who you’re targeting now and aim to target later.
Differentiation. What do you aim to offer differently than your competitors? Make it clear why enterprises should look at you. What’s in it for them? The more attractive this answer, the more enterprises will talk to you.
Principle: Focus on learning from reality instead of speculating in meeting rooms.
3. Maximize Velocity
Danger ahead.
Sadly, too many companies still care too much about velocity. I perceive it as a distraction because our energy goes to the wrong things.
Who cares about velocity?
More features aren’t the same as more value
Output metrics distract you from getting real
Many people disagree with me on this one.
Let me tell you why you shouldn’t care about such metrics.
Velocity will tell how fast you can deliver, but it will show nothing about how valuable that is. Improving velocity has no guarantee of delivering more value.
My take is simple:
Product teams must measure outcomes
Adapt their actions to drive desired results
Focus on achieving results over performing tasks
Everyone is accountable for results
The work is finished when the value is created
Clear? Maybe you’re still not sold.
Features are a means to an end. They aim to create value, but that will only happen if users understand how to interact with and use them. Often, users surprise us, and we need to adapt. Iterating, learning, and driving value is what matters, not shipping features for the sake of it.
Principle: Continuously measure value created so you correct course fast enough.
4. Please Stakeholders
It’s unbelievable that even today, too many stakeholders perceive product teams as their servants. Such misunderstanding leads to a service provider relationship. Nobody wins; everybody loses.
Here’s my take:
Gathering requirements? Nah
Doing what stakeholders ask for is poor product management
I focus on building partnerships, though that comes with facing conflicts
Strict? Yes. Necessary, more than that.
Requirements are statements of what teams must do, limiting them to deliver on that while distracting them from reaching goals. It limits collaboration to coordination.
It turns out that most requirements are just assumptions on how to solve problems, which should be tested. You will face a few hard requirements, but they are the exception, not the rule.
Depending on your scenario, you will have a strong disagreement with me. Let me give you some light.
Product management is a collaborative game. Product teams should serve customers while creating value for the business. That means collaborating to meet business and customer needs. If you aim to please stakeholders, you will be their puppets and rely on their decisions. How can you create a product without figuring out what end-users need?
It’s not about pleasing stakeholders. It’s about partnering with them. Together, you can thrive. If you do what I did ten years ago, you will learn the hard way that business wants are often misaligned with end-user needs.
Principle: Focus on building partnerships with business people instead of being their puppets.
5. Say “Yes” to Everything
The core of product management is prioritization. The more work you put in parallel, the less meaningful work you can do. Now comes the hard part: you need to reject more requests than people are ready to accept.
Yes = responsibility
No = decision
Every yes you give is a responsibility you take
My first technique was poor: I’d reject every request three times. When the person came the fourth time, I’d listen. Yet, my boss got too many emails, and I got a new nickname: The Business Blocker. Don’t do that.
I found something that works better. Help others say no to themselves. Ask questions:
How did you come to this idea?
How does it align with our vision?
How does it support our strategy?
Which evidence do you have supporting it?
What does success look like?
If I say yes to this, what can I say no to?
The above shows curiosity and helps with establishing a dialogue. People will unlikely have convincing answers to everything, so you can decide where to invest time and where to cut. In short, anything unrelated to vision, strategy, and current objective is a distraction, so you want to avoid it.
Principle: Help others say no to themselves.
Being a good PM is unconventional to many. Yet, they don’t care. They remain true to themselves instead of wasting their and others’ time.
Good PMs don’t do what’s easy. They do what’s necessary.
Shall we rock the product world together?
You can get my book, which is all about doing product management when everyone distracts you from it :)
Let’s rock the product world together!
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Have a lovely day,
David
But this approach does not work in real life, I think it needs some focus areas too.